Females account for between 15-20% of engineering and computer science students at universities in the UK. I had heard the numbers, but they had failed to capture just what it would feel like to find yourself in a large lecture room filled with 150 students, only 20 of whom were female.

In Tech City we've heard stories of companies choosing to deliver videos by jumping on a bicycle rather than uploading it via their broadband connection. MPs have joked about carrier pigeons being faster than the internet. It's high time things changed.

The Black Friday/Cyber Monday weekend exposed the shaky digital infrastructure of a number of Britain's most prominent retailers. Major brands experienced online outages, succumbing to the sheer quantity of customers logging on to splurge their festive millions.

Other general purpose technologies, like electricity, created similarly utopian visions. These are easy to criticise, but the change created by digital technology, both real and imagined, increasingly shapes our sense of the possible.

Within the world of mobile, many still see Apple as the leading name; the iPhone remains a synonym for "cool" and new apps are typically developed for its operating system before any other (with some never appearing in Android-compatible form at all).

Looking back, 2014 was the year of digital maturity. It's hard to believe that Facebook was only created 11 years ago and Twitter nine years ago. They've become such huge parts of all our lives and have even entered the dictionary as verbs!

This month marked an important step in the move to making data-driven healthcare a reality here in the UK, with the government unveiling new series of plans that promise to make accessing the NHS as simple as online banking.

The vernacular of 'Science 2.0' has become increasingly utilised in the debate about the future of science. Many media articles and conferences focus on this topic, and the European Commission has recently held a public consultation to better understand the impact of 2.0 and desirability of policy action to enable it.

It's a widely held belief that the UK's small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. With 99.9% of all UK private sector businesses classified as SMEs and a collective turnover of £3.3 billion, they're an economic force to be reckoned with,

As we sat in the middle of our mats, eyes closed, James asked us to picture our 7 year old selves sitting in front of us. And as we breathed our ujjayi breath (ocean breathing) with mouths open, each of us looked into the quizzical face of our 7 year old selves as they looked back and asked, 'How are we doing? How are we doing as an adult?'

Another September, another school year.... But 2014 brought something new: coding as part of the school curriculum in the UK. This is great news for students, of course - but should we do even more to encourage the use of technology in schools?

I can't say Jarvis Cocker has ever featured large in my life, but last week he definitely caught my attention. On Monday night, he whispered in my ear (via Radio 4) as he explored the realms of the night with the BBC Philharmonic on Wireless Nights.

It's the fate of every parent to be subjected to the latest childhood craze: one generation's friendship bracelet is the next generation's loom band. But what I see now isn't just another collectable bit of coloured plastic; it's far more interesting than that.

Having famously spurned offers from Facebook and Google, rumor has it that Snapchat is finally about to succumb to one of its many suitors - with Yahoo expected to make a cash injection which values the company at $10 billion.

We learned this week that as part of the Conservative election manifesto the party will promise GP access seven days a week by 2020. This is to relieve pressure on hospitals, giving working people access to a doctor at weekends, with family doctors able to consult patients via email and internet video link as part of the plans.

The initiative from techUK with their manifesto that calls for the government to invest more in digital technology is essential to the development of the sector here in the UK. The manifesto urges politicians and policy-makers to recognise the critical significance of the global digital revolution.

20 years ago we were leading the way in technological advancements, and now our children will be provided with the skills that will present them with the opportunity to become the new masters of technology.

Today, Norman Lamb MP announced the creation of a taskforce to improve children and young people's mental health services. Amongst other things, it will consider how we can make it easier for young people to get information and support without the fear of stigma which is all too often a barrier to people seeking the care they need.

Adopting a digital-first strategy has helped drive continuous innovation and improvement of our editorial content. It has given us the chance to develop new, immersive ways of storytelling. Doing so has required the development of new technologies, like our recently launched new Guardian app or our award-winning interactive features, to improve how our content is delivered to readers and to ensure that our editorial teams have the best tools to bring their stories to life.

Ever since the British government announced the introduction of computer programming into the school curriculum a year ago, a flurry of organisations have established related initiatives to improve the digital literacy of young people across the country.

There's a revolution occurring in how our urban spaces are managed, but success is less likely to come from grandiose projects and more likely to derive from a series of small improvements... Smart cities are still attainable, but we're learning from experience that the big bang approach isn't always best.

It's the year of mobile. 1998 was the first year I heard someone utter that dreaded phrase. However, even though most of us still have to deal with 2% battery life by lunchtime - mobile is unequivocally taking over the world. It's a beast; a complex beast. You've got 4G, NFC, BLE, Wi-Fi and countless other TLA's (Three Letter Acronyms to the uninitiated) to navigate through.